How to make a GitHub Web page, friend.

Installing Git

To create a GitHub Web page, you first have to install git onto your computer. There are several methods that work for some and not for others so you might have to try a few methods before you find one that works. There are several options listed on the git website, linked here. If you have an older mac this website works. After you believe you’ve installed it, open RStudio or restart it if you had it open and try opening a new project. If you are able to select Version Control –> Git, then you can be assured you have it installed.

If you have any issues installing git, I would recommend googling your problem as there is likely a solution on the internet.

Setting up a GitHub page

Now that you have git installed, you can create an account on github.com. After creating an account, create a repository. I added a Readme file to show a description of my website and made the license MIT so that people cannot use it for profit. Click the code button on your new repository and copy the clone link into a place where you can recall it. To generate a personal access token, which will be needed to link your local repository with GitHub, go to settings under your profile –> developer settings –> personal access tokens –> tokens (classic) –> generate new token (classic). Set the expiration to a date when you will no longer need the token. Save this token somewhere where you can recall it.

Linking GitHub to your local computer

Now in RStudio, in the upper right corner hit New Project... –> Version Control –> Git this will clone your GitHub repository onto your local computer through git and RStudio. In the Console section of RStudio, install the credentials package by typing in install.packages("credentials"). Following this, run this code:
git config --global user.email "put github email here"
git config --global user.name "put your name here"
credentials::set_github_pat("put PAT here")

Now your RStudio project should be linked with your GitHub repository.

Web page content

With your RStudio linked to GitHub, create an R Markdown... in the upper left corner. Name this new R Markdown “index”. Naming a page “index” will make it the main page of the website. Now you can type in the lines below yaml code which is separated by a —- usually around line 6. Finally use the backwards apostrophe symbol to to fence text if you want it to appear as it is. For example, you might write this is how you make a word **bold**, instead of this is how you make a word bold. Here is a useful guide for common formatting tips:

Adding changes to your web page

Now that you have created your text, you must add your changes from your local computer to GitHub. To get the status of local files compared to github write git status in your Terminal section of you RStudio work space. Run git add -A to add all your changes, then run git commit -am "note" to commit all your changes. Write a description for your changes in “note”. Commits save a version so that you can return to it if necessary. Create commits to keep a record of your changes. Run git push to push your changes from your computer to GitHub.

Creating the web page

Finally, back on GitHub, go to your repositories and select your repository. Go to settings –> pages and under Branch select None and change it to master branch. This will create the web page. It may take a few minutes but a link to it will appear under GitHub Pages.